I have recently discovered that cake is an excellent mode of procrastination. The yellow cake I made last night turned out quite edible and here is the recipe! Sorry if I overexplain. This is for those of you who, like me, have very little theoretical and empirical background in cooking. It’s also the first time I’m writing a full recipe, how exciting!

YOU NEED:

150-200g butter

1 small cup sugar (white)

1 small cup white flour (mine was type 405)

1 small cup of mango pulp (found in the cupboard from the previous lodger. It is very liquid, even more than the food for toddlers that comes in mini jars)

handful of raisins

handful of walnuts

salt

baking powder

cinnamon

3 eggs

20ml milk

vanilla sugar

cake tin generously lined with baking paper (so you can slide the cake out easily)

How to make it:

Mix sugar with butter and cinnamon on the bottom of a big pot until it’s all one big fluffy mess. Doesn’t work with cold butter. Hold the pot over a gently heated hob for a minute or two if it’s out of the fridge and you can’t wait – just make sure you don’t actually heat it, just melt the stubborn butter. While it’s melting, you can quickly open the tin of mango pulp and drink some 🙂 The mixing takes about 5 minutes and is hard work – best done with a wooden spoon. Throw in the eggs (no shells!) and mix again, this time with a whisk. Then fold in the flour and a pinch salt (mix it all with the wooden spoon again). Almost there! Throw in the raisins and the walnuts (you can crush the walnuts into smaller pieces while throwing them). Pour out a little milk into a cup and mix in the baking powder and pour the mixture into the cake. Mix again. Switch on the oven to 180′ (fan + heating both bottom and top, if your oven can do that – if not, just 180′). While it’s heating up, pour in the mango pulp and mix well, enjoying the splash of yellow.

Voila! Pour it all into the baking-paper-lined cake form and stick into the oven for about 30-40 minutes – or until the cake is tall enough and brown enough! Make sure you don’t open the oven in the first 25 minutes at all, because the cake will go on strike and won’t rise (what an oxymoron. anyway). If your oven doesn’t have a light, you’re stuck because you can’t open the door to check whether it’s ready. No, just joking. If there is no light, just keep it in for 30 minutes, then peek in and check to see the cake has risen and had got a nice crack. Or stick a match (the wooden bit!) into the cake. If it’s clean when you take it out, the cake is done. If it’s sticky, it needs more baking.

If anyone tries this, let me know how it works out!

I put on five morello cherries from a jar of compote because I thought red would looked pretty on yellow – and because I had them and I can eat them on anything (even steak)(I know, I’m a morello cherry addict). Germany is a blessed territory on which morello cherries in all forms are in abundant supply. If you don’t have any at hand, despair not – just leave the cake ungarnished, or sprinkle some sugar powder on top after it’s cold.

I used an almost full (4/5) normal teamug, like the ones you get in Wilkinson:-) The mug holds about 300ml of liquid so probably the quantity I used equals one full US cup. I put in equal looking amounts of everything. And the cake form is a normal rectangular one, too.